The present invention relates to a product development support method, a product development support apparatus and a memory medium therefor which can be applied to a development of products such as a vehicular air conditioner.
It is a general practice in developing air conditioners mounted on automotive vehicles to repeat a trial manufacture and testing to finalize the product design. That is, a development product is repeatedly trial-manufactured and tested under various conditions, so that a performance of an air conditioner is determined.
In the vehicular air conditioner, dehumidification and heating functions are required. Air is once cooled by a heat exchanger. The cooled air is then heated partly or entirely again and air-mixed so that the air regulated at a desired temperature may be supplied into a vehicle compartment.
However, air-mixing is largely influenced by an internal construction of the air conditioner, that is, by size, shape of an air conditioner internal unit, by position and shape of the heat exchanger and the like. Therefore, designing vehicular air conditioners is not simple.
Specifically, testing the air-mixing performance requires a lot of manpower, because the air-mixing performance is influenced by a number of factors. As a result, designing and producing the air conditioner requires a lot of manpower and cost.
The present invention has been attained to solve the above problem, and it has an object to provide a product development support method, a product development support apparatus and a memory medium therefor which enables a product development in less time and cost.
According to the present invention, a solid model of a product to be developed is determined, and an analysis solid model is determined by removing from the solid model an analysis impediment element which impedes product analysis. A product analysis is performed by using the analysis solid model. Preferably, the solid model and/or the analysis impediment element are corrected based on the result of product analysis.
In the case of a vehicular air conditioner, the solid model is determined with respect to a casing part and its internal air space, and the analysis impediment element may be a tiny or minute part, tiny or minute edge or the like in the air space. The product analysis is performed with respect to the mode of air flow, distribution of temperature and the like in the air space.
As the analysis method, finite-element method and finite volume method are generally used. By using those methods, mass conservation equation, momentum conservation equation, energy conservation equation and the like are solved. The air flow speed, temperature and the like in the air space can be determined by numerically solving those equations. It becomes possible to evaluate if the product is acceptable once the speed and the distribution of temperature are determined.